Members of the Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent

Mr. Ahmed Reid (Jamaica), Chairperson

Mr. Reid is Associate Professor of Caribbean History the City University of New York. He received his Ph.D. in Social and Economic History from the University of Hull, England. Dr. Reid's research interests include Caribbean Economic and Social History, Comparative Slavery, the Transatlantic Trade in Africans and Reparation. He is the author and co-author of several articles and is the recipient of several prestigious research fellowships, including from Yale University's Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance and Abolition and the John Carter Brown Library, Brown University.

Dominique Day, (United States of America)

Ms. Day is a human rights attorney and the executive director of DAYLIGHT | Rule of Law • Access to Justice • Advocacy. Internationally, her litigation, public policy, research, teaching, and capacity-building work over the past two decades has focused heavily on racial justice, non-discrimination, and human rights advocacy. She has extensive experience in criminal and civil litigation on behalf of individuals and communities within the Black diaspora, in addition to working on rule of law and access to justice issues in post-conflict and transitional States. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Harvard University and a juris doctor from Stanford Law School.

Michal Balcerzak (Poland)

Mr. Balcerzak is a professor of international human rights law at the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Poland. His research areas include international human rights law, protection of national minorities, international judiciary and litigation and diplomatic protocol. He is currently alternate Member of the Management Board of the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights. He has also served in various committees of the Council of Europe as an expert on thematic human rights issues.

Sabelo Gumedze (South Africa)

Mr. Gumedze is the Head and Senior Researcher of the Research and Development Unit of the Private Security Industry Regulatory Authority (PSIRA) of South Africa. He has over 10 years of experience in research with a background in legal scholarship and practice, policy development, International human rights law, human security research, analysis, training, teaching, supervising, project management and implementation. He holds a Doctor of Social Sciences in International Law from Åbo Akademi University (Finland).

Mr. Ricardo Sunga III (Philippines)

Mr. Sunga is an Assistant Professor at the De La Salle University College of Law in the Philippines. He teaches constitutional law and international law. He also serves as the Director of the Developmental Legal Advocacy Clinic, the clinical legal program of the same university. He has written several academic articles on international human rights law. A member of the Philippine Bar, he is the Regional Coordinator for the National Capital Region of the Free Legal Assistance Group, the oldest and largest organization of human rights lawyers in the Philippines.